polycultural's Profile
The Best Places to Work + Dine
I'm looking for more places to get some work done while I nosh on delicious food. I sometimes work at Jimmy's No 43 for an early dinner (no air conditioning and few non-alcoholic drinks, but food is great), Get Fresh Table & Market for lunch (quiet, good food, snacks, great selection of non-alcoholic drinks), Bark Hot Dogs (a little $$ and lots of kids there lately), or Ace Hotel for either lunch or dinner (OMG BURGER, great coffee, studious atmosphere), but I'm looking for more such places.
Asturian cider
I had Asturian cider when I was in Madrid and I periodically crave it. It's delicious- dry and fresh, which goes well with other Asturian delicacies like their amazing tangy blue cheese. Is there anywhere to get it in NYC?
Foodie needs a good gluten free menu
You might want to try a raw vegan restaurant. I like Pure Food and Wine, it has great ambiance. Rockin Raw in Brooklyn is also very nice. You can also call the major steak houses like Prime Meats and ask if they can do gluten free.
Anthony Bourdain vs Alice Waters
I don't think her approach will lead to good, local, organic food for everyone. I Schools can barely do adequately nutritious food in general....I'd be happy to see that even if it wasn't organic or local.
Seems like Bourdain is buying organic milk for his kid because it sounds healthy or something. I think that's why lots of people eat organic, but having studied in extensively when I got my masters in ag economics, I wish people would did a little deeper. USDA organic is a huge mess and when I see schools bragging that they serve Horizon Organic Strawberry milk (which is chock full of added sugar and from what are basically organic factory farms) I die a little inside and try not to imagine all the healthier dishes they could be making with simply just vegetables from anywhere.
"These pampered, "free because am on TV," meals, are the same expensive meals that you mentioned that you and your AB cheering friends cannot afford."
Actually, I get these too. That's one of the perks of working in food. I get to make poverty level wages and eat Jean Georges, but regardless, I love that AB shows that good food can be had at any price.
Anthony Bourdain vs Alice Waters
I cook, as I said it can be like a second full time job. I've gotten better at it thanks to a slow cooker I wisely invested in thanks to the advice on another cookbook author. There are lots of other people out there doing more realistic approaches to eating better.
I throw my grassfed short ribs in the crock pot with spices from a tiny Korean shop and come home to a wonderful meal at night.
Anthony Bourdain vs Alice Waters
Haha, yeah, I actually eat the quick cooking kind for breakfast often. It's not terribly good though. I'm sure Waters views the quick cooking kind as "cheating."
Either way, I don't see it becoming the breakfast de jour in the housing projects anytime soon.
Anthony Bourdain vs Alice Waters
I would like to see a food guru realistic about the long-term results of unsustainable agriculture and the industrialization of the food supply AND about home economics.
That's not Alice Waters. Her approach might win the heart of foodies, but it's not going to make big changes.
*Get out of that mind-set and tell yourself cooking is a meditation. I like to do it. It's relaxing for me to come home -- it truly is! -- and wash the salad. I love to see the salad in the sink. To spin the salad. I like to dry it. I like to pound to make a vinaigrette with my mortar and pestle. I enjoy grinding coffee and putting it in the filter and warming up the milk. It's part of a ritual that gives my life meaning and beauty.*
This philosophy is nice, but it's unrealistic to assume that all Americans should spend hours a day cooking and if they don't want to it's because they are uneducated.I think Bourdain could be won over to the cause of sustainable food if he dialogued with someone more pragmatic and from a less pampered background like the immigrant family we work with that raises chickens in their backyard and makes them into delicious homemade chicken tamales that they sell out of a cooler for a dollar. Or the busy moms working to make ends meet who receive prepared healthy foods made with local ingredients at a community kitchen. In that same interview she basically says that people are choosing to buy frivolous things instead of eating healthy. She completely fails to grasp how stressful life is for low-income people. Cooking up polenta in a roach-infested kitchen in the projects after working all day scrubbing floors? It's something to work towards, but I think her artisan home-cooked approach is only realistic for a certain group of people.
Anthony Bourdain vs Alice Waters
As one who actually works in the locavore movement, in my experience Bourdain is more popular than Waters, at least among those working on the grassroots in farms, non-profits, community kitchens, etc. because none of us can afford posh "locavore" restaurants like hers. A farmer friend of mine jokes that we both end up growing and promoting food we can't taste ourselves because of our meager salaries. When we are in the city we hit up street carts and eat offal in strange dives in Chinatown like Bourdain. We don't sit around in the kitchen cooking polenta for hours. We have other jobs and even though they are food-related, we don't have a lot of time to cook. I sometimes feel like keeping a kitchen stocked full of locally-grown food and cooking it is like having a second full-time job.
Since I am not posting under my real name, I'll say that most of what Alice Waters says infuriates me too. I know she means well, but she isn't realistic about the average American and most of what she says ends up sounding like classicism, which is something the locavore movement is struggling to combat. Mostly what she says just sounds annoying..
Things are changing now as the grassroots of the locavore movement continues to expand and include more people who don't exactly rake in the dough like my farmer friend and I. In my own few years working, I've seen a switch from wine to beer and infrastructural service projects for food carts. Food carts in particular are doing better than ever thanks to foodie support, which has led to increased legal protections and support for people (often poor immigrants) who want to earn money by opening them. In the future expect to see tripe soup from a sketchy cart sourced from a local farm!
In the meantime, just here to say I love Tony Bourdain and what he has done to encourage the acceptance of street food and offal, which are incidentally as important to the food justice movement as locavorism is.
Champaign, IL: Cafe Luna
Seriously? Thanks for posting this. I'm so going there on Mondays now.
Yeah, they are having brunch this week. I called them to confirm.
Champaign, IL: Cafe Luna
I haven't been there myself, but I've heard good things about brunch at Carmons.
Your favorite resturant in Champaign-Urbana, IL and why
Tried Manolo's a couple of days ago (http://www.manolospizza.com/). The fresh basil and mozzarella pizza was fantastic. I'm not much a deep dish or greasy pizza fan, so I've had a hard time finding Illinois pizza I like, but this was truly good. Wonderful red sauce, really fresh fragrant basil, and delicious cheese. $$$, but worth it. Anything there with portabella is great as well, since they are marinated in balsamic vinegar.
Best bread here is hand's down Mirabelle, though Baking Fool in Monticello and Great Harvest are decent as well.
Love the tapas at Cafe Luna, fantastic use of meat. Up and comer is Papa George, where Pickles used to be, which also uses good cuts of meat and Montgomery's which has a lot of farmer connections.
Less fancy good places include The Red Herring, a vegan cafe, Woori-Jib for Korean BBQ, Courier Cafe, old time soda fountain, and Siam Terrace.
